Resisting climate hysteria
by Richard S. Lindzen on Quadrant Online
July 26, 2009
A Case Against Precipitous Climate Action
The notion of a static, unchanging climate is foreign to the history of the earth or any other planet with a fluid envelope. The fact that the developed world went into hysterics over changes in global mean temperature anomaly of a few tenths of a degree will astound future generations. Such hysteria simply represents the scientific illiteracy of much of the public, the susceptibility of the public to the substitution of repetition for truth, and the exploitation of these weaknesses by politicians, environmental promoters, and, after 20 years of media drum beating, many others as well. Climate is always changing. We have had ice ages and warmer periods when alligators were found in Spitzbergen. Ice ages have occurred in a hundred thousand year cycle for the last 700 thousand years, and there have been previous periods that appear to have been warmer than the present despite CO2 levels being lower than they are now. More recently, we have had the medieval warm period and the little ice age. During the latter, alpine glaciers advanced to the chagrin of overrun villages. Since the beginning of the 19th Century these glaciers have been retreating. Frankly, we don’t fully understand either the advance or the retreat.
excerpts:
For small changes in climate associated with tenths of a degree, there is no need for any external cause. The earth is never exactly in equilibrium. The motions of the massive oceans where heat is moved between deep layers and the surface provides variability on time scales from years to centuries. Recent work (Tsonis et al, 2007), suggests that this variability is enough to account for all climate change since the 19th Century. Supporting the notion that man has not been the cause of this unexceptional change in temperature is the fact that there is a distinct signature to greenhouse warming: surface warming should be accompanied by warming in the tropics around an altitude of about 9km that is about 2.5 times greater than at the surface. Measurements show that warming at these levels is only about 3/4 of what is seen at the surface, implying that only about a third of the surface warming is associated with the greenhouse effect, and, quite possibly, not all of even this really small warming is due to man (Lindzen, 2007, Douglass et al, 2007). This further implies that all models predicting significant warming are greatly overestimating warming. This should not be surprising (though inevitably in climate science, when data conflicts with models, a small coterie of scientists can be counted upon to modify the data. Thus, Santer, et al (2008), argue that stretching uncertainties in observations and models might marginally eliminate the inconsistency. That the data should always need correcting to agree with models is totally implausible and indicative of a certain corruption within the climate science community).
…
Climate alarmists respond that some of the hottest years on record have occurred during the past decade. Given that we are in a relatively warm period, this is not surprising, but it says nothing about trends.
Given that the evidence (and I have noted only a few of many pieces of evidence) strongly implies that anthropogenic warming has been greatly exaggerated, the basis for alarm due to such warming is similarly diminished. However, a really important point is that the case for alarm would still be weak even if anthropogenic global warming were significant. Polar bears, arctic summer sea ice, regional droughts and floods, coral bleaching, hurricanes, alpine glaciers, malaria, etc. etc. all depend not on some global average of surface temperature anomaly, but on a huge number of regional variables including temperature, humidity, cloud cover, precipitation, and direction and magnitude of wind. The state of the ocean is also often crucial. Our ability to forecast any of these over periods beyond a few days is minimal (a leading modeler refers to it as essentially guesswork). Yet, each catastrophic forecast depends on each of these being in a specific range. The odds of any specific catastrophe actually occurring are almost zero. This was equally true for earlier forecasts of famine for the 1980’s, global cooling in the 1970’s, Y2K and many others. Regionally, year to year fluctuations in temperature are over four times larger than fluctuations in the global mean.
…
In view of the above, one may reasonably ask why there is the current alarm, and, in particular, why the astounding upsurge in alarmism of the past 4 years. When an issue like global warming is around for over twenty years, numerous agendas are developed to exploit the issue. The interests of the environmental movement in acquiring more power, influence, and donations are reasonably clear. So too are the interests of bureaucrats for whom control of CO2 is a dream-come-true. After all, CO2 is a product of breathing itself. Politicians can see the possibility of taxation that will be cheerfully accepted because it is necessary for ‘saving’ the earth. Nations have seen how to exploit this issue in order to gain competitive advantages. But, by now, things have gone much further. The case of ENRON (a now bankrupt Texas energy firm) is illustrative in this respect.
…
And finally, there are the numerous well meaning individuals who have allowed propagandists to convince them that in accepting the alarmist view of anthropogenic climate change, they are displaying intelligence and virtue For them, their psychic welfare is at stake.
With all this at stake, one can readily suspect that there might be a sense of urgency provoked by the possibility that warming may have ceased and that the case for such warming as was seen being due in significant measure to man, disintegrating. For those committed to the more venal agendas, the need to act soon, before the public appreciates the situation, is real indeed. However, for more serious leaders, the need to courageously resist hysteria is clear. Wasting resources on symbolically fighting ever present climate change is no substitute for prudence. Nor is the assumption that the earth’s climate reached a point of perfection in the middle of the twentieth century a sign of intelligence.
Read the complete essay with references at Quadrant Online
Richard S. Lindzen is the Alfred P. Sloan Professor of Atmospheric Sciences at Massachusetts Institute of Technology
h/t to Bob Carter
Saw this over at “small dead animals”. Another “model” prediction down the tubes:
So science daily reports that “the models” predict one of the largest “dead zones” recorded. The next day it is reported that the dead zone is half the “expected size”.
Two questions:
1. Why do models always seem to predict doom, things always getting “worse” or do we just hear about it only when they predict doom?
2. Why, time after time, when the models have been shown to be either grossly incorrect or forecasting things going in the opposite of observations do people still report the model forecasts as if they are “actionable” and policy can be based on them?
timetochooseagain:
“eric (07:20:09) : “In fact the idea of AGW is 100 years old, is based on radiation physics and the temperture dependence of the vapor pressure of water.” Apart from the fact that you can’t even spell temperature…CC BOUNDS WV it does not determine it!
“The other factors that determine climate are also observed and modeled to determine their impact.”
This statement is false. Period. Before the seventies, there are no observations of solar irradiance, and even after that the can be stitched together so as to have a trend or not-guess which version is preferred? Aerosols are also little observed. Before Pinatubo Volcanoes were not carefully observed in their effects. And on and on. But crucially, more than any other factor: Observations of clouds are just starting to get of sufficient quality for climate analysis. I can’t put this in any more polite way-you are either totally ignorant or lying.’
How about this publication in 1981 by James Hansen, who was an expert on the effect of aerosols, having studied sulfates on Venus as part of his PHD thesis.
http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/213/4511/957
“Climate Impact of Increasing Atmospheric Carbon Dioxide
J. Hansen 1, D. Johnson 1, A. Lacis 1, S. Lebedeff 1, P. Lee 1, D. Rind 1, and G. Russell 1
1 Atmospheric physicists at the NASA Institute for Space Studies, Goddard Space Flight Center, New York 10025
The global temperature rose by 0.2°C between the middle 1960’s and 1980, yielding a warming of 0.4°C in the past century. This temperature increase is consistent with the calculated greenhouse effect due to measured increases of atmospheric carbon dioxide. Variations of volcanic aerosols and possibly solar luminosity appear to be primary causes of observed fluctuations about the mean trend of increasing temperature. It is shown that the anthropogenic carbon dioxide warming should emerge from the noise level of natural climate variability by the end of the century, and there is a high probability of warming in the 1980’s. Potential effects on climate in the 21st century include the creation of drought-prone regions in North America and central Asia as part of a shifting of climatic zones, erosion of the West Antarctic ice sheet with a consequent worldwide rise in sea level, and opening of the fabled Northwest Passage.”
Areosals, solar luminosity are mentioned as fluctuations about the increasing temperature trend and were considered in Hansen’s paper, contrary to what you claim.
Climate modelers credit solar variations with causing the increase in temperature earlier in the century.
Hansen’s paper has been basically right up to now.
Professor Lindzen wrote:
“In view of the above, one may reasonably ask why there is the current alarm, and, in particular, why the astounding upsurge in alarmism of the past 4 years. When an issue like global warming is around for over twenty years, numerous agendas are developed to exploit the issue. The interests of the environmental movement in acquiring more power, influence, and donations are reasonably clear.”
I recalled a conservation I had with a fellow student in the late 70s, having read many a university prospectus, I reckoned that I was fairly familiar with most faculties courses, in Geology, Geography, Biol’, Geo’ Chem’ etc. When playing football for the Uni, in the process of getting to know team mates, I enquired about particular courses people were studying, answers were varied, and one guy piped up “environmental science”!- puzzled I asked,
“Whats that all about?”
He said, “29% science and 80% BS!”
I do remember the discipline being fairly new to British campuses and I think the environmental lobby has never looked back.
“Science or Social Science?
Environmental Studies (ES) degree courses have now been operating for well over twenty years. Responding to the first great rise in awareness of environmental issues, the early pioneering courses established a tradition which many other HE institutions have followed. ES takes an holistic approach to the study of the environment. This means that it has to transcend the science/social science divide, and also be prepared to accept insight from the arts and humanities. So, although a basic training in environmental sciences (ecology, geology, climatology, biology etc.) will be included, you will also get a foundation in social science (politics, economics, sociology etc.) However, it is probably only in the first year that you will encounter these traditional disciplines as separate subjects. A genuinely inter-disciplinary Environmental Studies degree will offer integrated modules in areas like waste management, rural and urban planning, ecotourism and resource management, gradually becoming more specialised as you progress to your final year. It is this wide range of areas, taught in an interdisciplinary fashion, that makes Environmental Studies such a distinct degree.”
from http://www.instudy.com/articles/ec191ao7.htm
Oft said in (my neck of the woods) – Yorkshire, ES -tis “neither owt nor summat.”
Mixing Politics and Humanities with science is never perfect as Curious George alluded to, just ask Isaac Newton, but it is the human condition.
Ain’t life a greenhouse gas!
James (10:21:28) : “What have you got backing up your slur against Prof Lindzen?”
About as much as Lindzen has to back up his conspiracy theory. 🙂
CARTHAGE, Tenn.–On his 1998 tax returns under “supplemental income,” Vice President Al Gore lists a $20,000 royalty payment from Union Zinc Inc. for the right to mine zinc from his 88-acre farm here in the verdant hills of the Cumberland River valley. In the 25 years he has held the zinc lease, Mr. Gore has earned more than $450,000.
The man who provided Mr. Gore with that farm and mineral lease is of some note as the 2000 presidential race begins. Mr. Gore’s father, former Sen. Albert Gore Sr., acquired the land and mineral rights on what appears to be highly favorable terms from Armand Hammer, the late chairman of Occidental Petroleum Corp. Mr. Hammer, an influence peddler of the highest magnitude, trafficked in politicians of all parties and stripes; he pleaded guilty in 1975 to making illegal contributions to Richard Nixon’s campaign in the Watergate affair. But the closest and most sustained of Mr. Hammer’s connections seem to have been with the elder Mr. Gore and his family. It was the earliest of a number of controversial associations that tarnish the stiff Boy Scout image of Al Gore Jr.
Gore has held these apocalyptic views about the environment for some time. So why, then, didn’t Gore dump his family’s large stock holdings in Occidental (Oxy) Petroleum? As executor of his family’s trust, over the years Gore has controlled hundreds of thousands of dollars in Oxy stock. Oxy has been mired in controversy over oil drilling in ecologically sensitive areas.
In 1922, Secretary of the Interior, Albert B.Fall leased the entire Teapot Dome Reserve for twenty years to his friend, Harry F. Sinclair, head of the Sinclair Oil Coporation with no competitive bidding. It was later proved that Fall had accepted a bribe for the transfer of naval oil reserves to privates interests and he was sent to prison. In fact, Teapot Dome became the legacy for Warren Harding’s administration.
In an eerie re-enactment of Teapot Dome, Al Gore, endorsed the sale of the OTHER Naval Oil Reserve, at Elk Hills which is located near Bakersfield, California. President Clinton proposed sale of the Navy’s Petroleum Reserve in 1995 saying the oil field was no longer needed for emergency fuelling of America’s ships.
Savage notes:
“The DOE (Energy Department) received a total of 22 bona fide offers but decided to sell this “crown jewel” of oil and gas fields to Occidental Petroleum Corp.”
As much as all that, James? Well show us.
20% Doh! should use number pad.
Joel Shore (10:00:42) : “It might help you understand what I am saying if you read more than one sentence of what I wrote at a time. Then you wouldn’t embarrass yourself by responding to strawmen arguments but could actually address my real arguments.”
It would be helpful if you provided links to charts illustrating the data to which you refer. For example, provide a chart showing both UAH and RSS LT measurements.
RW (10:47:19) : ““there is a distinct signature to greenhouse warming: surface warming should be accompanied by warming in the tropics around an altitude of about 9km that is about 2.5 times greater than at the surface”
This is not a distinct signature to greenhouse warming. The same response would be expected from warming due to increased solar activity.
Since we know solar output has been pretty steady lately, it can’t be that. Therefore, it can only be greenhouse warming – if it is there, that is.
Your point that this site is dominated by skeptics is true, but then RC is dominated by AGWers. The polarization is natural, though it may be somewhat unhelpful for a useful dialogue.
I will note, however, that dissenting views are allowed as much as possible on this site. If they are reasonable and polite, they are never snipped. It takes genuine talent to get repeatedly censored here. We have a number of regular pro-AGW posters, and they are most welcome here. (And, as a moderator of this site, I can say that with some authority.)
REPLY: Ditto that. – Anthony
eric:
I do not know if you are still monitoring this thread, but I hope so. I agree with you that Dr. Lindzen goes a bit over the top with some of his comments that imply conspiracy among people who believe the IPCC version of AGW; perhaps it is a reaction to the quite horrible accusations he is subject to every time he questions the magnitude of AGW. Still, Dr Lindzen (like everyone) would do better to stick to the technical issues, and leave out ad hom attacks, questions about motives, and obviously political statements. There is a chance for constructive dialog on AGW if we can accept that people sincerely believe what they say and are not motivated by a “leftist agenda”, “right wing ravings”, or because they are either stupid or acting as a shill for oil companies/greens/etc. Some of your comments about Dr. Lindzen are clearly not constructive, like:
“I am appalled that a prestigious scientist such as Lindzen can make such illogical arguments, and misrepresent the scientific theory that supports AGW.”
Can you not accept that someone with Lindzen’s background, obvious intelligence, and many contributions to climate science over 35+ years might not believe he is misrepresenting the scientific theory that supports AGW? Given Lindzen’s knowledge of climate science, might his arguments be something other than completely illogical, or at least worthy of a careful and reasoned discussion? At a minimum, might Lindzen not have pure motives like the advancement of scientific understanding, or perhaps the desire to have humanity avoid economically damaging policy decisions?
I am certain that you and I have very different views of the credibility of the warming predicted by GCM’s due to infrared absorbing gases, but I am willing to accept that you reach your view based on your analysis of the available data and best understanding of how the world works. I hope that you could accept that I (and no doubt many other people) have reached my current “skeptical” view of AGW in the same way as you have reached your view.
In the end, we can’t modify physical reality. The best we can hope for is reasoned progress toward understanding what that reality is. Accepting that someone who disagrees with you may be motivated by the best of intentions is not easy, but is necessary for constructive communication. Or, as Mr. Obama said “We will extend you our hand if you will unclench your fist.” I offer you a constructive dialog.
A bit OT but perhaps it will exacerbate the urgency of the agenda-desperate bunch for carbon control:
The DMI polar temp thumb on the right side above, shows temps north of 80deg is bouncing on the low side of average and near freezing. Alert, Canada, which is at roughly 82deg, shows a 5 day weather forecast averaging at the freezing point and snowfall for each day. This means the beginning of refreezing in the arctic for the area within the 80deg circle is drawing nigh:
http://www.wunderground.com/global/stations/71082.html
Thanks for the link Jim, I’ve saved it as a quick way to demonstrate to my AGW believing freinds that they are (sadly) deluded.
Jim (09:11:44) :
Joel Shore (08:20:54) : “For example, the two major satellite data analyses (UAH and RSS) don’t agree well with each other.”
Spouting this kind of BS make you lose your credibility. UAH and RSS agree very well. See:
http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/rss/from:1980/plot/uah/from:1980
It starts at zero and ends at zero, with lots of natural variation in between. Also the scales are very handy: what does 0.2° feel like? How can you measure such slight heat on a global scale? I’ve got them reading Lomborg so the lights are coming on slowly but surely.
“This means the beginning of refreezing in the arctic for the area within the 80deg circle is drawing nigh”
In fact it looks like the cam on the “pole”(in quotes because it has drifted a considerable distance from the pole) buoy shows rain and snowmelt ponds appear to be freezing over. This refreezing is much earlier than in 2007 and 2008. Another thing I have noticed is weeks of no sunshine on this year’s “pole” cam. Lack of sunshine may actually be a bad thing for next year’s ice because it is generally sunlight that causes salt to work its way out of the ice during the summer. A cloudy summer could mean saltier ice next year.
But in any case, it does appear that the refreeze is beginning though that can change. I noticed that Cryosphere Today shows a decreasing anomaly and NH ice area flat the past couple of days but there was a decreasing anomaly this time last year, too.
(By the way I realize it doesn’t exactly end at zero but I think a margin of error is tolerable on such a fine scale and for such and awe inspiring, complex system. +0.2°/-0.2° is nothing to get hung up about)
Paddy (10:03:19) :
1. Who is Joel Shore? What are his scientific credentials, if any?
Paddy, I find Joel Shore pretty obnoxious, too, but if you took the time to do the research, you’d find his credentials are pretty good: Ph.D. in Physics. He’s not a climate scientist, but his credentials to evaluate the science are at least as good as yours or mine…. I’d LIKE to be able to dismiss him, but there is probably something to be learned there…. even if he is wrong.
Water Vapour, Ignorance and Misunderstanding is Everywhere
Politics of Climate Science: Selective Research, Ignored Facts.
By Dr. Tim Ball Monday, July 27, 2009
http://canadafreepress.com/index.php/article/13170
Reality Provides the Ugly Fact.
All computer models have the positive feedback mechanism built in so warming predictions are no surprise. The problem is the real world is not cooperating. Richard Lindzen demonstrated this clearly at the Third International Conference on Climate Change, (June 2009). He presented this diagram that compared model predictions with real world data (top left graph).
As Lindzen noted, “What we see, then, is that the very foundation of the issue of global warming is wrong.” He then identified the real problem. “In a normal field, these results would pretty much wrap things up, but global warming/climate change has developed so much momentum that it has a life of its own – quite removed from science.”
Thomas Huxley said, “The great tragedy of science – the slaying of a beautiful hypothesis by an ugly fact.” The hypothesis that human CO2 is causing warming is slain because they essentially ignored the role of water vapor in the atmosphere, but when used it was done incorrectly. Of course, none of this speaks to clouds, the other major water problem in the atmosphere for the global warming hypothesis and computer models. Now the world is in a blind alley with energy and economic policies based on predictions from climate models that omit major elements and use false assumptions.
eric (09:49:06) : “With the world population close to carrying capacity, social instability is a real risk under these circumstances.”
This was to add to the horror to expect with global warming, floods, droughts, etc. Interestingly, the population of the world would fit into Lake Superior with 15 sq.m. each to tread water in. If you wanted to be real cozy, 90 billion people could fit in Lake Superior with 1sq.m. to tread water in. Oh and at about 100 Btu/hr of heat loss per person, someone here can tell us how much they would warm up the lake.
Steve says:
Try doing a linear trend through the data ( http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/rss/from:1980/trend/plot/uah/from:1980/trend/plot/hadcrut3gl/from:1980/trend/plot/gistemp/from:1980/trend ). You will find that the trends are somewhat different. It is not a huge difference…but it is a difference…and as you can see, it is significantly larger than the difference in trends over the same time period between RSS and either of the surface records. (What matters here are the slopes…The offsets are due to different base periods.)
And, as I noted, I believe that the tropics only data shows significantly more difference in trends.
Steve Fitzpatrick
“Can you not accept that someone with Lindzen’s background, obvious intelligence, and many contributions to climate science over 35+ years might not believe he is misrepresenting the scientific theory that supports AGW? Given Lindzen’s knowledge of climate science, might his arguments be something other than completely illogical, or at least worthy of a careful and reasoned discussion? At a minimum, might Lindzen not have pure motives like the advancement of scientific understanding, or perhaps the desire to have humanity avoid economically damaging policy decisions?”
I thought I made clear why his statements were illogical. The people who supported the greenhouse theory of global warming were not using recent data to do so as he claims. The upper tropospheric warming is known to be a result of solar or GHG warming, it is not a unique signature of GHG’s. The satellite data does not definitively show that the warming is absent. The data is not that good that we can say that warming is not in accordance with theory. All of this is accepted science.
It seems his desire to avoid what he considers economically damaging policy decisions has induced him to make misstatements about the state of the science. There is also an documented element of his personality that he is a non conformist. These 2 motives acting together could explain Lindzen’s writings, in my opinion. That said, it is impossible to really determine what
is driving a person, unless you know him intimately. Whatever the reason, I am appalled that someone with his background would say the things that he does, and makes arguments that any scientific person who knows something of the subject cringe.
“I am certain that you and I have very different views of the credibility of the warming predicted by GCM’s due to infrared absorbing gases, but I am willing to accept that you reach your view based on your analysis of the availabe data and best understanding of how the world works. I hope that you could accept that I (and no doubt many other people) have reached my current “skeptical” view of AGW in the same way as you have reached your view.”
Most of the people posting and reading here have done no research in climate. That includes me, although I have done research in physics and elerctrical engineering. If 97% of active researchers in climate science are unanimous that AGW is real, I think the burden of proof falls heavily on them to explain why they believe the opposite. So far, most of the reasons I have seen don’t compute scientifically.
“In the end, we can’t modify physical reality. The best we can hope for is reasoned progress toward understanding what that reality is. Accepting that someone who disagrees with you may be motivated by the best of intentions is not easy, but is necessary for constructive communication. Or, as Mr. Obama said “We will extend you our hand if you will unclench your fist.” I offer you a constructive dialog.””
Attributing motivations is not part of any argument that I make about Lindzens scientific reasoning being wrong. However if people are going to claim bad motivations for others, like Lindzen does in the last 3 paragraphs of the opening post, they should be prepared to have their motives questioned as well.
timetochooseagain says:
I have to admit that I found Lindzen’s take puzzling since it disagrees with what I have seen said by others in the field. However, then I read his last paragraph in Section 2 of that paper:
In fact, I think that others in the field would say that the amplification seen in the models is dominated by this “tendency”…and, in fact, where the greenhouse gases do their absorbing is essentially irrelevant to the temperature structure (because the tropical atmosphere is quite well-mixed by convection). As evidence of this, one can point to the fact that different mechanisms of warming (such as an increase in solar irradiance, or simply fluctuations in temperature due to ENSO or other effects) show similar amplification in the models as one goes up in the tropical troposphere (and, in the case of the fluctuations, this is verified in the real world).
I think Lindzen’s claim that the moist adiabat explanation “does not alter any of the above arguments” is disingenuous. It makes an important alteration in that it no longer allows one to point to the (supposed) lack of such observed amplification as suggesting the mechanism causing the warming must be something other than greenhouse gases!
First of all, it is not an issue of satellite vs surface temperature data as much as an issue of over what timescales the satellite and radiosonde data is reliable and what timescales it isn’t. And, the deal is this: the up-and-down fluctuations over timescales of months to a few years are quite reliable in both these data sets because they occur over times short enough that there should not be any significant drift. However, the multidecadal trends are less reliable because of significant potential artifacts that can contaminate them. For the satellite data, this has to do with various issues, with one being the intercalibration between the different satellites that have been used over time. For the radiosonde data, it has to do with changing instrumentation and, in particular, with the fact that there has been a general improvement in shielding of the temperature sensor over time (which tends to produce a cooling artifact to trends for daytime measurements). As I noted, the fact that there are problems with the satellite data set for the tropics is evidenced by the fact that the UAH and RSS trends for the tropics still differ fairly significantly from each other.
Eric:
As a starting point in a constructive dialog:
1. “All working scientists agree that CO2 doubling without any other feedback or changes in forcings will increase the average temperature 1C if nothing else happens.”
Agreed, it is a direct consequence of how a ~255K black body responds to changes in radiative heating.
2. “In addition, in Permian times CO2 from Siberian volcanoes has been determined to have caused a global warming event which impacted the oceans.”
Agreed, although potentially different conditions on Earth in the Permian and uncertainty about the volcanic emissions may make it difficult to draw accurate conclusions about Earth’s response to CO2 (and other infrared absorbing gases) today.
Do you agree with the following statements:
1. The wide range of effective blackbody emission temperatures (each temperature with a different expected radiative sensitivity) across different latitudes and across different seasons makes the “1C for a doubling of CO2” sensitivity value not a very useful number, in that it may not accurately represent the correct climate sensitivity in the absence of any climate feedbacks, negative or positive.
2. Given that a) the basic “1C for a doubling of CO2” may not be correct, b) that there are many plausible climate feedbacks (negative and positive) operating over a range of temporal scales, and c) that the climate is clearly chaotic over very short to at least multidecade temporal scales, determining a reasonably accurate value for the climate’s sensitivity to forcing is a difficult problem that requires a lot of good data, collected over a time period that is comparable to the range of chaotic variation, along with careful analysis.
3. Substantial differences in estimates of climate sensitivity will inevitably lead to substantial differences in expected future warming, and substantial differences in the perceived urgency of acting to reduce emissions of CO2.
If you can’t agree with the above statements, then please explain why.
rephelan says:
Your statement of my credentials is correct. I would just add a couple of things:
(1) I really try not to be “obnoxious”. However, it is frustrating when I post something and someone quotes like one or two sentences of it and goes off in some direction of responding to a “strawman” version of my argument when reading the whole thing would make it clear that I wasn’t saying what they are claiming that I said. (It is also frustrating when people continually repeat things like the greenhouse effect violating the Second Law of Thermodynamics that are just very, very wrong.) Sorry if this frustration sometimes makes me say something snarky; I’m trying to avoid that.
(2) I don’t claim that my PhD in physics alone makes me knowledgeable in climate science, as there are lots of specialized knowledge to learn in each field of science these days. And, I am sure that Richard Lindzen has probably already forgotten more atmospheric science than I will ever know; however, this is all the more reason why I find it frustrating to see him make an argument that at the end of it he sort of admits may not be totally correct but that this isn’t really relevant (as he does in the paper that timetochooseagain linked to)…when in fact, I think it changes the nature and strength of his point quite a bit. Anyways, I’m still learning and one of the advantages of posting comments here on WUWT is that it provides me with the incentive to go and read up more in the climate science literature on various issues.
Joel Shore (14:24:26) :
This post is an enormous improvement. I invite you to joint in a constructive dialog with eric and me (see above).
You are welcomed to reply to my three statements if you want.
Joel Shore (13:45:06) : Here is your chart with offsets applied. I have reason to doubt GISS so it is no comfort that RSS slope matches GISS or even HADcrut for that matter. UAH might well be the right one AFAIK. I have not had much time to look, but I don’t find similar charts for tropical LT.
http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/rss/from:1980/trend/offset:0.14/plot/uah/from:1980/trend/offset:0.11/plot/hadcrut3gl/from:1980/trend/offset:-0.005/plot/gistemp/from:1980/trend/offset:-.1
“It is not a huge difference…but it is a difference”
Of COURSE there is a difference. There basically HAS to be a difference. Data from different sources that are “adjusted” differently by different people will result in different results. Note that while the various points differ VERY slightly from each other, the overall trends match.
Now when NOAA’s and GISS’s product is compared to either satellite, the difference grows over time and even trends recently in opposite directions. So the satellites tend to validate each other while they tend to invalidate NOAA, GISS and HadCRUT.
I believe one major difference is that there are no atmospheric surface air temperature readings over more than 2/3 of the surface of Earth and some of those data sources want to use ocean temperatures as some sort of proxy for air temperature over the ocean while the satellites measure the actual temperature of the atmosphere over the oceans. Ocean surface temperature are more a function of wind speed than air temperature. Increased trade winds result in lower tropical sea surface temperatures. You can experience that first hand (so to speak) by dunking your hand in water, placing it in front of a fan and turning the fan on. Fan on = cool surface, fan off = warmer surface, in both cases the air temperature was the same.
It would be highly suspect if both RSS and UAH both produced exactly the same result every month because they are using different data sampled at different times by different equipment with different groups of people using different methods of reaching the result.
eric (13:51:54) : “There is also an documented element of his personality that he is a non conformist. ”
1. You supply no documentation of this and
2. being a non-conformist in science is a good thing. Science is one field where thinking outside the herd can get you a new way of looking at something.